


The lily among the thorns (the prey among the wolves)

by thesweetpianowritingdownmylife



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Don't read if you are part of the CR cast or crew, F/F, Mind Control, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-12
Updated: 2019-12-12
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:33:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21769183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesweetpianowritingdownmylife/pseuds/thesweetpianowritingdownmylife
Summary: Jourrael has been waiting 800 years to be free again, only to fall to a charm spell the minute she wakes up.She's resentful. But at least one of her companions is interesting.
Relationships: The Laughing Hand & Yasha (Critical Role), Yasha & Jourrael, Yasha/Jourrael
Comments: 13
Kudos: 155





	The lily among the thorns (the prey among the wolves)

**Author's Note:**

> I have no shame. Also my beta-reader is sick and this is barely edited because I have to go make her some soup (my beta-reader is my wife).  
> Title from the song "Feel for you" by Nightwish.

“Are you charmed, too? Or are you free?”

It’s the first thing the aasimar says, on the third day, when Obann flies up into the sky to scout the horizon. Jourrael knows they only have a few seconds out of their gaze, not enough to struggle against the spell. But maybe it’s enough to press its boundaries.

She evades the command in her mind, shackling her to their ragtag group, and finds she has enough control over her neck muscles to shake her head.

The aasimar sighs, deflated. “It’s okay. I wouldn’t have been able to convince you to leave anyway.”

She is correct. If Jourrael had taken on a mission, there would be no power on any plane who could have convinced her to abandon it. Once she had a target, there was no calling her back. But Obann had not respected the ancient traditions, had not come at her with gifts and offerings for the Spider Queen, hoping to sway her to his favor; had not tried to convince her of the threat of his enemy, so that she may slay it as a service to Lolth. No; he had just put a measly charm on her, severing her will from her body, and expected her to obey his every whim.

Funny, though, that freeing her from her prison would have, if accompanied of a polite request, been enough payment for her services.

The aasimar looked up, to where Obann was perched on top of a tree, his attention still absent. She took the opportunity to pat the Laughing hand on his back, saying, “Everything okay, big guy?”

One of the mouths in his chest giggled.

“Good to know,” she whispered, and sat back with a practiced, hollow look in her eyes.

It did not fool the demon; when he came back, he redid the spell on her, feeling her slipping from his power.

Jourrael looked on, and committed it to memory.

…

Orphanmaker, he called her. It was not a name that she relished, for she cringed every time he used it. Jourrael wondered which one she would like better.

…

She was not weak, Jourrael could see that much. Even under the command, the ease with which he carved through bodies spoke of experience, of blood spilled, although in much messier ways than Jourrael’s. But she cried; every life she took, she mourned, tears trailing down her face, unstoppable, even when Obann ordered her to restrain the sentiment.

“Offer them to your god,” Jourrael murmured to her as they washed their weapons by a stream, far from their captor. “Then their deaths won’t feel in vain.” Her voice was rough, unused for centuries.

She did not take her eyes off her sword. “My god’s not watching.”

There was a rumble of thunder, far away. It brought fresh tears to her eyes. Jourrael could not understand it.

…

“Ya…sha…” the Laughing Hand’s mouths rasped, “Ya…sha…”

The aasimar grabbed Obann’s arm, and looked at him intently. “Fine, you can heal him,” he said, disdain in his voice.

She lay her hands on the closed fist of the beast, and Jourrael could see how some of the mouths closed, the skin knitting back together.

“Is that better, big guy?” she asked, almost a whisper.

The hooded head nodded. There was no trace of the maddening cackles that had been plaguing them since the end of the battle.

_Yasha_ , Jourrael thought. She seemed to like that name much better.

…

Jourrael considers what would it take to kill her. As far as she knew, Yasha had no heart tucked away on another plane of existence, no sublimated body that could withstand dismemberment and dispersion. She was just a fallen celestial creature, powerful and beautiful as she may be. A dagger between the ribs would do the trick.

She considers what it would cost. A moment when Obann was away. Gigglefist too, he was fond of her.

She would need to evade the charm in her mind, find a justification and then convince herself of it, so that her muscles would obey her. She was good at moving through floors and walls and people; how difficult could this obstacle be?

Yasha might fight back, resist. Obann had explicitly ordered her to protect her own life, to prevent her from recklessly falling onto an enemy blade; a route of escape much too tempting. But she need not know of Jourrael’s intentions until it was too late. Her specialty was stealth, stealing breath before the target even knew she existed, but she had walked head on into a couple of missions. Sweetened her words. Seen the light leave betrayed eyes, not just blood seeping from a knife in the back.

The only real obstacle would be if she cried.

…

She does not like how Obann looks at Yasha, how he talks to her, all close and reverent. He speaks of the Angel of Irons, constantly, in whispered prayers, and attempts to convince Yasha of his purpose, on how honored she will be, once the Angel enters her flesh to live in this world once more.

He kisses her, once. Yasha bits him, pulls away, spits in his face.

The Laughing Hand roars, a cacophony of aggressive laughter.

Jourrael punches the back of his neck, makes his whole body seize and drop to the floor like a sack of potatoes. “Stop being a creep,” she says, voice dry and dangerous.

Obann hastily reapplies the charm to her, Jourrael just grins when he finds that it was not gone in the first place. She would have done that to any ally that behaved that way. She has not acted outside of the parameters.

…

The Laughing Hand collapses, and Yasha runs to his side, acting on instinct. She lays her hands on him, cries with despair when there is no change. Obann shoves her away, into the ground, and yells at the trembling monster.

Jourrael sees a hovering orb, watching above them. Whoever struck their blow is making sure it stuck. She smiles, and does not tell her captor. It’s not in her orders to reveal when they are being scryed upon.

As Obann screams, trying to compel the Hand stand, Jourrael helps Yasha off the ground, and whispers to her, “This was a friend.”

Yasha doesn’t like her comment. She doesn’t know why.

…

Yasha takes her hand, once.

“Kill me,” she asks in a whisper. Her hair is spattered with blood.

Jourrael squeezes her hand, doesn’t look at her. But she knows Yasha’s crying.

“I can’t.”

But not for the right reasons.

…

Yasha cries again, when Jourrael tells Obann that she has failed.

“I am not a melee fighter. I deal with enemies one on one, before they notice me.”

Obann strikes her and her body screams to fight back, yet there’s no way she can harm him. He stalks away fuming, and Yasha runs to her side, hand reaching.

“Did you kill any of them?” she asks before touching her.

She shakes her head, and Yasha heals her. She suspects she would have healed her anyway.

…

They march into a city on fire, unnoticed by all but the scryer. Yasha winces when both humans and drow are slain. They are received as heroes in the cathedral, and in its basement everything has been readied. The sounds of battle pull them back.

As she sinks to the ground, Jourrael hears her plead, “Please, don’t hurt them.”

She has opposite orders. She can’t escape these ones.

…

The will bending her own is severed, and for the first time in centuries, she is truly free. Yasha is glorious as she rips the wings off their captor, as she breaks Jourrael’s chains. Not a vessel for the Angel of Irons, but an Angel of Freedom.

Jourrael sinks through the ground to leave. Obann the Punished rises, but it’s not her fight. They yell at her, beg her to stay and help. She shouldn’t have to.

Yasha had not had any obligation, the times she had healed her or the Laughing Hand. She had often insisted to Obann to be able to do it.

Jourrael does not like owing people. So she turns around and destroys the lumbering, dissolving inferno of mouths and tentacles. Does not stay for a hug, or for a second glance.

Yasha won’t miss her.

…

It has not been 24 hours when a voice crashes into her head.

“Hi Miss Cadogeist! We’re in the Kamaruth Cottage. Do you want a job? He have a dude that needs killing. Oh, Yasha says hi!”

If it is a trap, it’s a poor one. Jourrael finds their room and lurks; Yasha and three of her friends are sitting on the bed, waiting, no weapons in sight. She searches the surrounding rooms, and finds the rest of their group huddled in a bed, a sleeping tangle of limbs. She checks for traps around the girl’s room and finds none. When she emerges, they all gasp.

“You’re cool, right?” the monk asks her. “Not gonna kill us or anything?”

Jourrael starts sinking back to the floor.

“No, wait,” Yasha pleads from the bed, “hear us out.”

Her voice is soft and tired, and Jourrael can’t deny her.

“We have heard you are like, the coolest assassin to ever live, and we have a very powerful enemy that should be dead,” the blue tiefling pipes up. “A match made in heaven?”

“We’re gonna pay you,” the goblin screeches. “Well we don’t have a lot of money. But we have shinies. And a gun. Would you be interested in a gun? It’s very good for murdering.”

“Nott…” the monk pinches the bridge of her nose, “how about I do the talking? Look,” she turns to look at Jourrael, “we mean no disrespect. I know you were the best of the best. And still are! I mean, I don’t know what kind of competition you have nowadays, I’m not in the assassin business.” She clears her throat awkwardly. “We are not asking for a handout; we merely want to ask what would it take to hire you, if you’re available for that kind of work, that sort of thing. If you were planning to go on an extended vacation after all of that bullshit, by all means. We just thought we’d ask.”

“My work is sacred,” Jourrael replies. “I took the missions that my goddess gave me. If you offered to bind yourselves to her, I could take that as payment.”

There is a tense pause as the girls looked at each other, horror fresh in their faces.

“That’s what I thought.”

Yasha stands from the bed and comes closer to her. She places a hand on her shoulder, delivering healing magic. Some of the tension on Jourrael’s shoulders slips out.

“Is there another way?”

Yasha starts taking her hand back, but Jourrael catches it with a swift movement. “This enemy,” her voice softens, a damnable weakness, “did he hurt you?”

“No. But he hurt my friend.” Her expression hardens. “He hurt a lot of people.”

“What would you give me for it?”

The tielfing starts, “Well-”

“I wasn’t talking to you.”

Yasha looks into her eyes. Her pulse is jumping under Jourrael’s fingers. “Anything.”

Jourrael steps forward, joining their brows. The others protest, but she pays them no mind. She can feel the other’s breath on her lips. “You are more foolish than I thought.” She steps back, and turns to the monk. “Give me a name.”

“Trent Ikithon.” Her voice is harsh, and she is looking between her friend and the assassin with distress. “He lives in this city, and he’s a powerful wizard. He will be well guarded, but we have no information on how.”

“Nothing can stop me.” She smiles, showing her sharp teeth.

Her hand is still wrapped around Yasha’s wrist.

“Be careful,” Yasha said, “and…” she sends an apologetic look to the monk, and kisses Jourrael’s cheek,“…come back to me.”

She nods and sinks into the floor. She has a mission to fulfill. And a place to return to, after.


End file.
